Several professional baseball players spoke out against plans by the Los Angeles Dodgers to welcome drag queens for an official event during the team’s Jun. 16 “Pride Night.” Dodgers Ace Clayton Kershaw protested the Dodgers’ invitation to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence and requested an alternative Christian Faith and Family Day event in July.
The 2020 World Series champions invited the drag group to a game. The original plan was to award the group, which includes former Biden administration official Sam Brinton, and give them an award.
Following public concerns over the anti-Catholic nature of the group, the baseball club disinvited the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. A number of officials and organizations protested the invitation of the drag queen group, including Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Catholic League president Bill Donohue.
However, further pressure from LGBT organizations led the Dodgers to reinvite the team last month. In a tweet, the team said they offered their “sincerest apologies” to the group, as well as to “members of the LGBTQ+ community and their friends and families.”
The Dodgers said that they will “better educate ourselves” over the incident.
However, the back-and-forth resulted in considerable concerns among players, especially Kershaw.
The pitcher asked the team to relaunch the team’s Christian Faith and Family Day. He announced the event on Twitter, writing that the event would be returning for the first time since 2019.
The starter said that he was “determined to make it bigger and better than it was before COVID.”
— Trevor Williams (@MeLlamoTrevor) May 30, 2023
Kershaw told the Los Angeles Times that he did not “agree with making fun of other people’s religions.”
Brinton briefly worked for the Office of Nuclear Energy before being prior to revelations of allegedly stealing luggage from several airports. Brinton was charged with felony theft last year in relation to a theft at Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport.
Brinton was arrested a second time regarding another alleged theft at Las Vegas’ Harry Reid International Airport late last year. The former official was implicated in another alleged theft at the Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in 2018.
